


Steven Universe Versus Crazy Steve

by Master_of_the_Boot1



Category: Batman: The Animated Series, Steven Universe (Cartoon)
Genre: Frank Miller - Freeform, Goddamn Batman, Parody
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-04-15
Updated: 2017-04-15
Packaged: 2018-10-10 04:35:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 11,010
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10429212
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Master_of_the_Boot1/pseuds/Master_of_the_Boot1
Summary: One fateful day, Steven Universe is abducted by a murderous hobo named Steve who thinks that he's Batman. It's up to the Crystal Gems and the real Batman to rescue everyone's favorite magic boy.Hilarity ensues. And property damage. And emotional trauma. And Goddamn Batman





	1. Goddamn Batman

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this while working on a novel and feeling burned out. Everything I wrote was dark and grim. So I made this. It's not light and cheerful by most people's standards but it was damn fun to write. Plus I had fun parodying the most infamous man in comics, Frank "Wingnut" Miller. 
> 
> Love it or hate it, you be the judge. 
> 
> Now enjoy and constructive criticism is welcome.

15 hours ago

The scene opens up with a familiar podcast. The title and the music intro are well known to use despite or perhaps because of being so bargain brand and amateurish.

_Keep Beach City Weird!_

All done up in fonts that many of us abused as children in early nineties computer class, it strangely suits the pretentious and immature personality of one Ronaldo Fryman; fat bastard and conspiracy theorist extraordinaire.

And that is where our story begins.

“Citizens of Beach City and those who wish to take the red pill everywhere,” Ronaldo begins, as an advertisement for male sexual enhancement appears near the bottom of the screen. “As many of you know I’ve dedicated my life to the truth that The Deep State and the Rothschild’s don’t want you to know about.”

The rotund young man leans forward in his rolling chair and begins to speak like some old timey priest high on opium fumes and god knows what else. “While I’ve dedicated much recent news to the strange baby eating rock people which terrorize us, some attention must also be paid to the so called Bat Man.”

“While some hail this flying rodent as a hero, I and my loyal followers know better. This Bat Man is in fact an agent of The Deep State; distracting the sheeple with his dog and pony show—fighting colorful freaks and lunatics but never once going near the true owners of this country: the Sneeple!”

Ronaldo takes a deep breath before resuming, now ads for Pick Up artistry books running across the bottom of the screen.

_(One Weird Phrase that takes away women’s free will! Only $9.99!)_

“Some of my enlightened cohorts believe that Rothschild’s descendant and International Jewish Banking Cartel member Bruce Wayne is the batman since only he has the wealth or the means to achieve such a goal for the ruling hidden powers. But the truth my viewers, is much stranger.”

Ronaldo leans in to break the news to the true believers. “You see my friends, I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that the true identity of this flying rodent is not Bruce Wayne or the hated Statist George Soros. The Bat Man is in fact a crazed homeless man who won the lottery and now pursues his dreams of eliminating criminality from the face of the earth while dressed as a chiropteran!”

**Crash!!!**

Something breaks off of camera and Ronaldo shits his pants. “Oh Christ!” he screams right before everything goes black.

 

* * *

 

_Now_

Batman finished replaying the podcast footage in the HUD of his cowl. The Dark Knight scowled at the ID stamp that had come with the data packet.

Walter Kovacs

One of the Question’s newer aliases.

There wasn’t a note or a description with the video the Question had sent him; this wasn’t out of character for the madly paranoid vigilante whose detective skills possibly surpassed Batman’s own. That wasn’t the part that got to Batman and made him expect the worst more than he already did.

“Oracle,” he spoke into the suit’s hidden microphone. “Get me the latest twenty-four hour news reports regarding Beach City, Delmarva.”

“Just a minute, Bruce,” came the voice of Barbara Gordon, aka Oracle; arguably the world’s greatest hacker. “Woah.”

The silence on the line was deafening and it only deepened Batman’s scowl. He waited for Barbara to finish.

“Well, Bruce,” Oracle started, composing herself, “Right now at least six people are dead in Beach City with over forty seven critically injured. Half of the town is on fire and so far nobody has come forward to take credit for it. People are blaming a terrorist attack or the Joker.”

“Is there any evidence to suggest one over the other?” Bruce deadpanned.

Barbara paused on the line. “Well I’ll let you see for yourself.”

More footage played across Batman’s HUD, timestamped from the last two hours. As the detective’s mind began to work on ways to connect the Ronaldo Fryman video and this new chain of events, he couldn’t help but be horrified by what he was seeing.

From a grid work of different news screens from various TV stations, blogs and websites Batman could see a giant, flaming smiley face burned into a field with gasoline. He also saw a giant flaming DD, a flaming crow and his own Batman symbol burned in gasoline in various parts of beach city. These enormous pyromaniac works of art were spreading rapidly and threatening to burn down Beach City and the neighboring towns and counties.

People bloodied, bruised and traumatized; looking like refugees in a warzone paraded across a dozen cameras. The Fish-Stew Pizza restaurant and the Fry shop demolished as if by some high speed, indestructible vehicle. One of the sketchier news stations managed to capture footage of paramedics prying the severed head of the Mayor from the hands of his traumatized son.

“Why wasn’t I told about this earlier?” Batman struggled to keep the pain out of his voice; he felt sick. The faces of the traumatized citizens of Beach City burned into his flawless memory.

“Bruce, honestly you’ve got a lot of surveillance on the go. You’ve got a lot of enemies; deal with a lot of disasters and on top of it you were helping to handle the resurgence of Godzilla recently. There’s only so much you can do.”

Bruce said nothing, for all his skill and resources he was still just one man. He cut off the feed of news stories and disaster porn in his HUD, leaving him once more alone atop one of Gotham’s many roofs.

“Do we have any idea on the whereabouts of the Crystal Gems?” Batman asked his number one support crew.

“The Gems were last spotted by our drones just sixteen hours ago, right before that video you got was taken.”

Under the cowl, the Batman frowned. A pattern was emerging and he really didn’t like the way his projections were shaping up. “The Gems need to be informed. This is earlier than I had planned, but we need to reach out to them. Oracle, link me to the Watchtower, or better yet the Teen Titans.”

The rest of the conversation didn’t go as planned because an energy beam destroyed the gargoyle that Batman was crouched on. The concussive blast threw Batman horizontally and slammed him into a reinforced window.

Skull rattled from the impact and disoriented, gravity took hold and Batman went into freefall. Going for his grapnel gun, the caped crusader fired a shot at the nearest sturdy ledge. The hyper-motors on the gun kicked into gear and Batman flew towards solid ground—until something spinning purple like sonic the hedgehog flew through the air and severed the line.

Falling once more, Batman’s cape opened up as non-Newtonian fluid grew rigid and transformed into a glider. Batman steered his descent towards the monorail, hoping to snag a ride on the approaching train and flee his attackers. That was not to be as a red and black humanoid struck him in mid-air and launched the Bat like a soccer ball.

The wind was knocked from Batman’s lungs and he rolled across the gravel roof of an abandoned warehouse. He shakily got to his feet, the Batsuit protecting him from the worst of the impact, though his head had begun ringing. He was just beginning to suck in the air back into his lungs when he finally saw his attackers.

“This is your only chance, Batman!” shouted the normally cool and reserved Garnet. “Return Steven safely and you will not be harmed!”

Normally the most collected and poised of the Crystal Gems, Pearl stepped in front of Garnet armed with a stop sigh she’d ripped from the ground. “Give us Steven now!” she shrieked, on the verge of tears.

Per usual, Amethyst was the least diplomatic of the group. “We’re gonna cut your dick off, Batman!” To emphasize the point she waved a second hand sushi knife in the air like a sword. The short purple gem’s face was streaked with tears and snot dribbled down to her chin.

Batman weighed his options. He’d long ago drawn up plans to defeat the Crystal Gems if it ever came to that, but honestly he’d hoped to recruit them as allies to the Justice League or at least establish diplomatic ties with them. Maybe he could still get through this without having to resort to combat.

Ribs aching and muscles bruised, Batman tried to explain himself. “I don’t know where this person is. If they’re missing or kidnapped I can help you find them.”

“Liar!” shrieked pearl, on the verge of hysterics. “Liar! You took him; you took our little Steven Universe!” Her breathing grew ragged as she produced a deadly looking spear from her gemstone and brandished the stop sign in her hand. “Steven is out there in a cave, forced to eat rats and it’s all because of you, you psychopath!”

Batman was a master of expecting the unexpected, but even he was hard pressed to think of a reason why Steven Universe would be in a cave, eating rabies infested cave rodents. “I don’t know Steven’s location, I can help you.”

“Bullshit, FUCK YOU!!!” Amethyst cried out, her shapeshifting going haywire with grief and rage. “We saw you, we all saw you take away Steven and now we’re going to take him back. So talk, NOW!!!”

Bruce’s mind was working overtime. So evidently there was a batman imposter at play here. That in itself was nothing new; the real question was why would a Batman impersonator go out of Batman’s usual territory to kidnap a human gem hybrid?

Batman was given no further chances to testify as Pearl of all people charged at him screaming, driven insane by maternal instinct and loss. Pearl leapt at the Dark Knight with the grace of a gazelle, swinging the fifty pound lump of concrete at the bottom of the stop sign. She swung her makeshift mace, hoping to shatter Batman’s kneecaps into powder.

The Dark Knight waited until the last possible second, throwing down a chain of smoke bombs. Pearl was shocked as the smoke blocked off not only the human spectrum of light but her ability to see in infrared and ultraviolet as well.

The former gem servant charged through the smoke cloud only to comically run right off the roof of the building. That still left Batman with two PTSD afflicted, super powered space moms to deal with.

Amethyst charged at him in her purple sonic mode, with the added danger of a several thousand RPM sushi knife to one side. Springs in his boots activated and lent speed to Batman’s leap while he simultaneously reached into his utility belt and threw a burrito at Amethyst.

Like time was moving in slow motion, Amethyst leapt out of her spinning circular position and lunged at Batman’s crotch with her knife; hoping to either geld the Dark Knight or hit his codpiece with enough force to pulp whatever was inside. She could not resist her true nature however, as her jaws clamped down on the bat burrito as mindlessly as a shark chomping on a piece of chum.

The specially designed high energy explosive went off in the pudgy, purple gem’s mouth with enough force to turn an M1-Abrams tank into a molten pile. Strong as it was, the exploding burrito was designed to poof Amethyst without physically cracking her.

To Batman’s frustration, the explosion knocked her back and melted her knife but failed to poof her hardlight form.

Then there was Garnet, arguably the deadliest and most tactical of the crystal gems. Her future sight alone made her an unpredictable and dangerously tactical opponent, but this wasn’t the first time that Batman had faced a future seer.

The Batman began to move on pure instinct, using grapnel line and spring boots to keep ahead of Garnet’s powerhouse gauntlets. He didn’t plan or think too much as that would crystalize one potential future over another and tip off his hand to the large, Afro-British gem.

The Dark Knight struck a blow at Garnet. Given her intense durability, it should have done nothing. Instead, lines of crackling energy ran up Garnet’s form and the outlines of circuits bisected her body.

The experimental gem destabilizer was working as planned until Garnet lashes out and struck the power source at the elbow of Batman’s gauntlet.

Searing agony ran up Batman’s arm as the microfusion cell detonated, destroying the gem destabilizer and adding to the dark knight’s damage meter.

The destabiliser had worked but not well enough, it was time for a tactical retreat. Without another word, Batman threw himself over the roof and plunged to the Gotham streets below. Twisting and turning in midair, the cowl’s sophisticated computer system alerted him the direction of Pearl’s incoming energy beams and in split second simulations showed him the best way to evade.

“Oracle!” Batman called into his cowl. No reply. A sub vocal command brought up a system diagnostic of the suit as well as delivered a dose of intravenous combat drugs into his system. Temporarily relieved of pain by the drugs and altered, Batman saw the damage to the suit while still dodging.

Red warning symbols alerted Batman to the fact that the suits communications systems were down. Grudgingly, he had to give it to Garnet when she struck him that first time; she knew what she was doing.

Batman and his advanced computer guidance system could evade Pearl on the ground but a freefalling Amethyst used her whip to slice through his cape. Like a one winged bat, Batman went into a freefall tailspin.

Activating his gauntlet, he alerted the autopilot on the Batmobile while with his free hand he drew a spare grapnel. Hopped up on combat drugs, Batman’s reflexes kicked into metahuman levels as he fired the grapnel and caught threw himself into a swing Tarzan style.

Shredded cape flying behind him, Batman hit a hard roll that he surely would feel when the stimulants and painkillers wore off. He just narrowly missed Amethyst, who landed where he was with enough force to shatter the pavement.

Specialized rocket thrusters used just for occasions like this went off in Batman’s boots and took him out of the way of the Batmobile which had been speeding down the road.

The purple gem cracked her whip, just missing Batman’s carotid artery by a margin of millimetres. Meanwhile a frontal panel in the Batmobile opened up and fired an armor piercing missile at Amethyst.

The fiery explosion rattled Batman’s bones and showered his armored suit in shrapnel. Amethyst’s hardlight form gave up the ghost; turning into a gaseous compound which rapidly dissipated into the atmosphere.

The victory came at a price as a stricken Pearl stared down the charging, heavily armed, multi-ton superhero car. With a single sweep of her spear, she sliced the Batmobile in half; bisecting it and causing the two halves to crash on separate sides of the road. Battered hounded and beaten, Batman was just glad that there were no innocent bystanders around.

The white calcium carbonate gem charged at Batman, ready to cut his legs off when a panel opened up in batman’s gauntlet and fired a stream of pressurized ketchup at her. Pearl screamed as the ketchup hit her eyes and blinded her. Panicking, she used her spear arm to try and wipe the viscous, sugary liquid away. In her frenzied spinning, Pearl let go of the stop sign; which flew into one half of the Batmobile and bent it nearly in half with the impact.

A blow struck Batman from behind as a newly reformed Amethyst struck him from behind. Her form flickering from forcing herself to reform too quickly, Amethyst used all her willpower to keep her form; raising her arms over the downed Batman for what very well could have been a killing blow.

Suddenly Garnet stepped between Amethyst and Batman, taking the blow for the Dark Knight. Even weakened as she was, the impact rocked Garnet’s adamantine frame and would have done much worse to Batman, who was just as surprised by Garnet’s actions as anyone else.

“Stop,” said the stoic Gem with a renewed sense of urgency. “He isn’t the one who kidnapped Steven.”

Squawking and blinded from ketchup, Pearl shouted at a fire hydrant that she thought was Garnet. “This is preposterous! You saw it in your future vision! We all saw it on Ronaldo’s “secret” spy cameras!”

“That wasn’t him,” Garnet challenged, “For starters this man hasn’t called Amethyst ‘retarded’ like the true kidnapper would have.”

“What!” Amethyst cried out, her form flickering with exertion, “What the fuck are you talking about?”

“What!” Batman yelled, losing his composure for the first time; shock writ across his normally stern features.

Garnet explained, “It was another man, dressed like this man here. Had we been fighting him, he would have called Amethyst ‘a retard’ and would have called Pearl a ‘lesbo.”

“You know of this man?” Batman ground out; all of the worst possibilities and worst case scenarios playing through his mind. Whatever he’d expected or thought might have happened was nowhere near as bad as the truth; especially if Steven Universe had been kidnapped by just a specific individual.

“What aren’t you telling us? Tell us who has Steven! Tell us, Batman and we won’t harm you,” Pearl said to a mailbox, still struggling to get the ketchup out of her eyes.

Batman felt bad for the gems. They were not going to like what he had to say. “I believe Steven has been kidnapped by someone I’ve been trying to find for the last year; he is a mentally unstable homeless man who believes that he is me and uses lethal methods to fight crime. This individual has a habit of kidnapping gifted young boys to be his Robin figure, only to murder them when they don’t live up to his standards or else sexually abuse and molest them.”

Pearl gasped in horror as she finished getting the ketchup out of one of her eyes, Amethyst screamed in torment and punched the mailbox that Pearl had been talking to “STE-MAN!!!!!” she wailed, worried to death for her little brother figure.

Garnet looked at the Dark Knight through her shades, taking in the role of this man in the future that could be and the terrible futures that must never come to pass. “Will you help us find this man, Batman?”

Bruce grunted, the combat meds wearing off but his resolve stronger than ever. “My associates call this man Crazy Steve and you have my word that I will help you bring back Steven Universe safe and unharmed.”

 

* * *

 

_Meanwhile_

“I’m Batman!” said the large man in an animal costume.

“No, you’re not,” said Steven Universe.

“What are you, dense? Are you retarded?” snarled the man in a bat costume while doing a shitty Clint Eastwood impersonation. “I’M THE GODDAMN BATMAN!!!”

Steven looked at the man with a mix of pity and disgust, “No, you’re not,” he repeated.

* * *

Author’s note:

So that’s part one of this story. For the longest time I was working on my novel and everything I put on the page was grim and dark. Then I hammered out this chapter. And maybe this isn’t light and sweet by other people’s standards but boy was it fun.

And a lot of Batman fans in particular forget that, Batman should be fun. Steven Universe should be fun. Writing should be fun at least some of the time. And I had a ton of fun with this.

Let me know what you thought of it.


	2. Goddamn Universe

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steven finds himself awake and trapped in a cave with an insane man in an animal costume who possibly molested him while he was unconscious. Stay tuned to find out what happens and if the Crystal Gems and the real Batman can save him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is extremely graphic, contains references to death, dismemberment, rape and rape of a minor. Stay back if you don't like any of that.

Steven Universe versus Crazy Steve

Chapter 2: Frank Miller is still insane

Authors note: My fans expect a lot from me. I hope that I gave them what they wanted.

Also this was hard to write. For Crazy Steve I built much of his characterization from 4Chan bottom feeders that I had the displeasure of meeting online.

* * *

_Gotham Sewers, Six Months ago_

“So this is where you guys bumped uglies, Mista Jay?” asked Harley Quinn as she and her puddin’ stomped through a stinking, water logged sewer.

“That’s right Harley!” shouted back the Clown Prince of Crime with more irritation than usual. “When I saw this guy kill seventeen cops, molest a twelve year old and gleefully cackle while he lit some guys on fire, I thought Batsy had finally snapped and come to see the world my way!” The Joker cackled maniacally before continuing his story.

Joker held his hands together as a dreamy expression went over his ghoulish visage. “Upon seeing me he shouted ‘GODDAMN JOKER!’ and I shouted back at him ‘GODDAMN BATMAN! And we beat each other to the point of disfigurement.”

Then just like a switch had been flipped, rage filled the Joker’s heart. “Then as we fought our way down into the sewers and made hot, sweaty love I found that it was NOT BATMAN! Not only did he throw his batarang too early but it turns out he’s just some crazy Hobo Named Steve!”

Harley did her best to comfort her puddin’ “Dem’s the breaks, Mista Jay—ah, there’s poop over there! Anyway some guy does the horizontal mambo with ya and he never even buys ya dinner. It’s so sad,” she began to sniffle for emphasis as she and the Ace of Knaves reached a stockpile of hidden weapons and explosives. “Sounds like a real one pump chump.”

Joker began to set aside various guns, grenade launchers and novelty dragon dildos before pointing out a metal drum with a biohazard symbol on the side. “And here’s the rub, Harley; vengeance is mine! I’ve cooked up a unique batch of my Joker venom which causes its victim to die frowning! Because this guy laughs and smiles more than I do!”

The Clown Prince of Crime started cackling and it just touched Harley in that special place.

“Aw, Mista Jay, you set my flappy lovechunks on fire,” she cooed.

* * *

Steven Universe had seen a lot for a kid his age. In many ways it had traumatized him. Just last week his dad got thrown into county jail for years’ worth of unpaid parking tickets. That rat bastard devil child Navy had screwed him and his friends and sold them out to Yellow Diamond. None of that compared however to being kidnapped by a smelly man in an animal costume and inducted into some strange, vague war on crime.

“MAYOR Dewey was CORRUPT!!!! He WAS as dirty as THEY come!” said the smelly man right after he’d taken off his Bat costume to inject steroids into his scrotum, spine and neck. Steven refused to call this guy Batman. He just wasn’t.

Steven strained against the bonds holding him in the seat of the Batmobile and desperately chafed at the device which covered his gem; blocking off his normal set of powers. “You gouged Mayor Dewey’s eyes out, cut off his head and gave it to his son Buck; what did he ever do to deserve that?”

“That degenerate was PILLAGING the coffee FUND!” Crazy Steve bellowed in uneven emphasis, his booming voice amplified by the cramped confines of the MADmobile/Batmobile. “You give them ONE inch and they take A mile!

Steven couldn’t quite believe what he was hearing; the shock of it was almost too much. He’d laugh if he hadn’t seen the destruction first hand. “You killed the mayor for pocket change? Mister, you’ve got the same moral standards as the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, and you should feel bad about that!”

That statement really got under Steve’s skin. The hulking steroid fueled man scowled and threw a hard right hook into Steven’s jaw. “Don’t compare me to those camel fuckers, fag! I’m WORKING on a war on CRIME and I recruited YOU to help me! OUR enemies won’t REST until everyone AND everything that you love is DEAD!”

Steven only heard half of this as he spat out a tooth which had been knocked loose. Powerless to use him gem abilities, he could only watch numbly as Steve’s fist collided with his face and try to enjoy the fireworks behind his eyes before everything went black.

…..

……

…….

_Steven’s world gave way to blackness and the blackness gave way to dreams. The images were disjointed and blink-and-you-miss but they made their own kind of emotional sense. He saw his own birth where he’d exploded out of his mother’s head like HR Giger’s favorite porno fantasy. He could see the time at age five when he’d walked in on Pearl masturbating or when Garnet shaved off her cubic Afro._

_Things got clearer as the visions took him further in life. He could very clearly make out Amethyst’s marriage and eventual divorce to a faulty Wonder Woman clone._

_“You’re getting a divorce!” Steven Universe, age Twelve sobbed, giving his older sister figure, Amethyst a hug. “But you and Betty were so happy!” he continued to leave snot and saliva on the purple gem, who honestly didn’t mind._

_“Look, Ste-man,” said Amethyst, wiping the tears from Steven’s face, “Betty is kinda bonkers and the sex is great but we’re going to kill each other at the rate we’re going.”_

**CRASH!!!**

_Steven and Amethyst turned around as a tall Wonder Woman clone with ridiculously enlarged breasts and skimpy top floated into the house with a disgusted expression on her face. “Why are you huggin this weak MAN?” Bonkers Betty demanded. “Why do you sully yourself with the stinking, dog turd of MAN’S touch?”_

_Amethyst ground her teeth, “Betty, this shit is getting so old! Steven’s a kid and you and me are over!”_

_The defective Wonder Woman clone stomped the floor like a petulant cheerleader, causing the entire temple to shake. “You make me sick, Amethyst! You make me sick, Amethyst!”_

_“I make you sick? Fuck you!” Amethyst shouted through tears, “Being with you is the most miserable I’ve been ever! You jealous, unforgiving, short fused bitch! You only like me when I beat you; if you want to live out Fifty shades of Gray as your life story then do it without me!”_

_The defective clone kept repeating herself. “You make me sick, Amethyst! You make me sick, Amethyst!” Then one of her fists shot out and punched the little purple alien right in the gemstone._

_“Amethyst!” Steven shouted as his fun-mom fell to the ground, clutching the purple stone that was her entire soul, mind and heart._

_“You bitch!” Amethyst screamed in incandescent rage, “You almost shattered me!” Reaching into her pocket, she whipped out a small fishing knife and tackled Bonkers Betty to the ground. Flailing like a rabid puma, Amethyst began to stab the insane Amazon clone in the face. “Die, you bug fuck! Die! DIE!”_

_Things shifted in Steven’s dream state and he could see more clearly than ever the events of the night when he was kidnapped. He was at home, the gems were on a mission and he’d just finished the math assignments Pearl gave him as part of his home schooling. It was time for a sandwich._

_It was all ready to go, the pickles, the chocolate syrup and sliced ham. Then somebody shot him in the neck with a dart. Steven fell to the floor._

_As his consciousness faded, a cackling man in a Batman costume jumped out of the shadows with the worst serial killer grin he’d ever seen. Honestly it was fucking horrible, the Joker didn’t grin like that._

_“Big mouth, fast hands, my little Steven” the man chuckled in a way that made Steven’s nuts shrink up his into his body and his stomach sick. “Sleep tight, my little ward. I’m going to put you through HELL, and you’re to_ _like it.”_

_The man who most definitely wasn’t Batman laughed once more and placed a gem suppressor onto Steven’s quartz bellybutton. “Fast hands, big mouth; Steven Universe, age fourteen.”_

_That was the last thing Steven remembered before blacking out._

**Everything changed. Steven wasn’t just in his own dreams and memories anymore. The boy looked about and saw himself in a dirty alleyway in Gotham City, right behind the once famous Monarch Theater.**

**Something was definitely off. This wasn’t like when he’d accidentally taken over Lars’s body or bonded with Blue Diamond on an empathetic level. The dream world around him had a strange glossy sheen to it. It was difficult to put into words but this dream, these memories if that’s what they were felt fake.**

**The details were accurate as much as Steven could tell by the limited number of google searches he’d done on Gotham’s famous Crime Alley. But everything felt wrong.**

**Turning around, he saw three people who were dressed just like Bruce Wayne and his family before the Waynes were tragically gunned down.**

**This is where the memories started to fail. The people lacked the glossy sheen of the rest of the memory. The mother wasn’t Martha Wayne, the man wasn’t Thomas Wayne and the boy definitely wasn’t Bruce Wayne.**

**Steven glanced around the artificial memory world, looking for some crazed gunman or mugger. What he saw was something far worse. Not-Martha Wayne reached down and in sight of all present, began fondling the crotch of the twelve year old boy who wasn’t Bruce Wayne.**

**Steven’s eyes widened and he put his hands to his mouth in disgust at the presumed mother’s openly lecherous expression for her presumed son. “I think I’m going to be sick,” he moaned to nobody in particular.**

**Disgust was pushed to the back of his mind as a pair of gunshots killed both of the Not-Waynes.**

**The smell of cordite and smoke filled his nose and a primal terror and sense of loss flooded his skull. Cold sweat took him over and he began to dry heave. Through tear blurred eyes, Steven made out the not-Bruce Wayne numb and frozen over his head parents. The silence was deathly and Steven wondered if this feeling was what death was like. The death of a parent.**

**Shivering, heaving and tormented by the deaths of parents not like his own, the horror show wasn’t done yet. The not-Bruce looked down at his dead mother with an odd look that normally isn’t seen on the faces of mourners.**

**The boy’s breathing grew heavy and then a second later it clicked for Steven what the boy was feeling. Not-Bruce began to fondle his death mother’s bloody boobs.**

**“I touched my mother’s breast,” said Not-Bruce in the voice of Crazy Steve, “It bled on me.”**

“I wanna go home!” Steven screamed, waking up.

“Shut up,” Crazy Steve snarled at Steven, apparently unaware that the fat little boy had inadvertently gone into his tortured psyche. With one heave of his mighty arm he grabbed Steven and threw him onto the cold, slimy cave floor like yesterday’s laundry.

Steven groaned and gingerly picked himself off the cave floor. It didn’t feel good and it probably looked worse; one of his eyes was swollen shut and his broken nose leaned crookedly to one side. Blood stained the front of his pink, star adorned T-shirt.

“So what’dya think, kid, cool or what?” said Steve, who had stopped talking like he had a slipped disc or something. One of his Kevlar clad arms gestured to a near perfect replica of the real Batcave.

The boy’s one open eye widened with stars in it and Steven grinned despite his situation. “Whoa! This is awesome! Are those robots shooting lasers at a dinosaur?”

Steve was most pleased that Steven was pleased with his cool fort and didn’t immediately dismiss him out of hand or treat him like a psychopathic man-child like most people did. “NOW listen up, PUNK, because I’m only going to say this once! We’re AT war and OUR enemy will not relent and DESERVES no MERCY!” So he was back to talking like he had a hernia and was waiting for medical treatment.

Steven meekly raised his hand. “Uh, who is this enemy?”

“That’s NOT important!” Steve barked at Steven; the huge Batman imposter nearly foamed with rage and excitement for what was probably his first successful Robin. “We’ve GOT a mission, and it’s bigger THAN you or ME! You’ve been LIVING with those three LESBOS and their little Sailor MOON ideas of peace, love AND justice! You’ve SWALLOWED everything they TAUGHT you, LIKE love, respect for OTHERS and COMPASSION! We don’t have time for COMPASSION! We use our fists, OUR gadgets and our brains to beat the ENEMY! Because we don’t need fancy GEM powers!”

Steven once more raised his hand to ask the smelly man in a Batman costume a question.

“This BETTER be important, Dorothy!” the big steroid fiend snapped.

Steven thought better to ask why he’d just been called Dorothy. “Uh, can I get something to eat? I feel like I was in your car for weeks. Also can I take a shower somewhere?”

Steve scowled at the fresh faced youth he’d abducted, beaten and had insulted. “Food will present itself. I’ll be OUT for a bit.” Without another word, Crazy Steve fired his grapnel off into the shadows and vaulted off.

Steven was left alone and he very much wanted someone to hug him. He decided to look around for the food that Steve said would present itself. He saw a rabies infested rat which twitched painfully on the cave floor. He also saw some vampire bats sucking on a sleeping goat. Finally there was Deadpool, the Marvel character; who was spending his evening hanging on meat hooks.

“What are you looking at, fat boy?” The Merc with a mouth snapped.

Steven gasped before meekly apologizing, “Sorry mister, I’m a little out of it. Is there any food here?”

“Hey,” said Deadpool, not in the best of moods, “Screw you, Rebecca Sugar’s brother; I got my own problems. You think you’ve seen some shit? All the boxes in this comic are the same color!”

Deadpool then looked up at the boxes only he could see with the closest thing to existential, cosmic horror he’d encountered since he’d first gained his healing factor.

_White Box: What is the sense in making all the dialogue boxes the same color? You don’t know who’s speaking, whether it’s first or third person or even if it’s past or present tense._

_White Box: Oh! Oh! I know! It’s a new, experimental style! Just like when Frank did all his artwork in MS paint for DK2._

_White Box: WHAT am I DOING? I KIDNAPPED this little GAY kid who likes CROSSDRESSING! But I’LL make a MAN out of this little TRANNY homo kid if it KILLS him!_

_White Box: WHAT HAPPENED TO MY SON!_

_White Box: How long have you been Seventeen?_

_White Box: I’m Gabe Newell._

_White Box: Use the Force, Luke._

Deadpool was horrified and outraged by what he was seeing. He cursed to the high heavens to demonic, godlike entities that only he could see and understand. “What is your deal, Frank? What is your deal, Frank? Torgo does not know! Torgo does not know!” The Merc with a mouth then screamed as Frank Miller’s insanity infected him as well. Then he made the mistake of reading the time stamps on this comic.

“Okay, this story starts fifteen hours ago, and Batman meeting the crystal gem takes place . . . six months from now?! What the fuck?”

_Meanwhile, 2000 years later, tomorrow, on a Wednesday_

* * *

 

Batman welcomed the silence. Garnet was as quiet, as anti-social and as badly adjusted as he was in some ways. Pearl was chewing her fingernails with nervousness and terror, preventing her from worrying in any number of verbal or non-verbal ways. Only Amethyst dared break the silence in the cramped confines of the Batplane.

“Uh, hey bat dude, sorry for trying to cut your dick off” Amethyst offered.

“You’re not the first to attempt it this week,” Batman noncommittally replied.

Amethyst crossed her arms and huffed, “Fine okay, be a bat dick about it. Jerk.” The purple gem promptly transformed into a small purple bat and hung upside down from one of the control panels, occasionally shooting dirty looks at Batman. Batman gave zero fucks.

Pearl meanwhile was attempting to reach Greg in County Jail from her cell phone. “Pick up, stop putting me on hold,” she whined to herself. Finally Greg picked up on the other end. “Hello Greg!” Pearl said in an overly sweet voice. “Hi! I was just checking up on you in the correctional facility you will be spending the weekend at for repeatedly violating the municipal bylaws governing your hideous van and all other unsafe human ground vehicles.”

The white gem nodded and smiled as though Greg could see her. “Well I’m glad the butterscotch pudding is good, Greg. Anyway I called because I wanted to keep you in the loop. Yes, shortly after you were arrested and forced to pay a fine in conjunction with your jail time, Beach City was attacked by a supervillain who killed dozens and kidnapped Steven; also I’ve been informed this supervillain is also a pedophile but don’t worry about anything, we’re on our way to get Steven back!”

Batman felt a pang of sympathy for Greg. It was hard to hear a grown man burst out crying on the other end of a phone line before shrieking his son’s name like he was already dead. He fought to maintain his stoic composure as on the other end of the phone line he heard the sounds of Greg being tackled and beaten by prison guards as he wailed his possibly dead son’s name.

Pearl hung up the phone, wincing and placed it back inside her gem’s hammer space. “Well, that didn’t go as well as I’d hoped. You’d think that Greg would have more faith in our abilities by now.” She turned to the Dark knight, “Maybe I should have dropped your name, that might have calmed down Greg somewhat.”

Batman said nothing.

Then Garnet thrust a finger at the coordinate screen of the Batplane. “There!” she shouted, “Steven can be found at these coordinates. The Warp pad network is down in this area but we can make it in time if we move now.”

Pearl looked at the longitude and latitude Garnet had pointed to. “So, Crazy Steve’s lair is over an active volcano in Northern Canada. What the . . .” she trailed off at the ridiculousness of it.

“Let’s kick some ass!” shouted Batmethyst, holding her leathery wings open wide.

_Crazy Steve’s Batcave, today_

* * *

 

If there was one thing that confirmed that Crazy Steve wasn’t Batman, it was the guns. Several racks full of guns were on open display, fully loaded and with the safeties off in one corner of this imitation Batcave. The guns were organized and categorized next to several shelves and racks full of deadly medieval weapons. From the look of it the guy had enough swords, axes, bows and trebuchets to wipe Westeros off the map.

Steven was happily munching on a cheeseburger and fries that someone had left for him. After a little smell test to make sure it wasn’t poisoned, Steven happily wolfed down food that wasn’t squirming, living in its own shit rodent meat. His hunger and multiple blows to the head from a powerful, steroid infused man were holding back Steven’s ability to plan an escape, but this burger was a good way of resorting his focus.

A deep sense of love came over him as he savored the perfect mix of spices, salt and caramelization in the burger and the crispiness of the fries. His mind began to separate from his body, but in a more controlled way than he ever had before. Taking a deep breath, he held the burger like a religious icon.

Steven’s soul began to float through layers of stone before the beacon of a living mind attracted him. There, wailing on a punching bag was a man who’d had plastic surgery done on his features to look exactly like Alfred Pennyworth. Except for the fact that this guy was muscular like Vin Diesel, he could have easily passed for Bruce Wayne’s butler; they even had the exact same voice and speech patterns.

“How many days, months, weeks, and years have I watched over my little black eyed anger,” said the not-Alfred as he pounded the punching bag. “How many times did I bathe my little angel and wash away the blood, sweat and tears.”

Steven’s spectral form felt bile rise up in his throat. After getting into Steve’s mind it only made sense that his butler was a fucking sexual predator.

Not-Alfred continued to wax poetically while punching like mad. “My little dark eyes angel was always a warrior, a hunter and he could properly bang himself out in the woods.”

Steven gasped and covered his mouth. _“He would bang himself”?_ He wondered aloud, but not-Alfred was unable to hear him.

Not-Alfred then began to grab and fondle the punching bag like a really grabby strip club patron. “Has my little, petite angel gone mad? Have I gone mad?”

 _“Your master has totally gone wacko-Jacko!”_ Steven’s astral form shouted at not-Alfred, _“You’re both ape-shit crazy and you need to commit yourselves!”_

He couldn’t spend any more time with buff, Pedo-Alfred when Steven was suddenly dragged back into his physical body. Having his soul and mind return to his body brought Steven back into connection with the physical pain, the exhaustion hunger and the fresh punch to the face which surely fractured Steven’s cheekbone.

Steven Universe fell to the muddy ground next to the dead rabies rat, looking up at the grinning man with a maniacal grin.

“HOW’S it GOING, chum? Time to RISE to the OCCASION! I’ve brought your first test WHERE you can DECIDE! Decide if you’re AN avenger, or a DETECTIVE!”

Steven looked around; hoping that at any moment Captain America would walk out of the shadows and offer him a spot with the Avengers, right before kicking Crazy Steve in the fucking groin. What he actually saw made his blood run cold.

Bound and gagged by the side of the Batmobile was none other than Onion, beach city’s resident devil child. A pyromaniac who loved eating live mice, most people were disturbed and frightened of Onion. God knows that the kid was better with a harpoon gun than any two year old had the right to be. Then there was also the fact that him and his family seemed to share DNA with a species of bulb that made people cry.

Onion wriggled with all his might against the ropes and tried to spit out the red ball-gag that Crazy Steve had crammed into his mouth. Tears streaked down the strange, pale boy’s face and he pleaded to Steven with his normally dead, satanic eyes.

“What did you do?” Steven asked, not even having the energy to be surprised by Crazy Steve’s amoral depravity.

Crazy Steve gave a bellicose laugh that scared the bats in the cave. “This ONION kid is really SOMETHING! Onion, age two; HE’S got a criminal RECORD as long as MY arm! But the LAW won’t do anything ABOUT it! NO! They’ll just give him PSYCHIATRIC treatment, MAYB some BEHAVIORAL therapy! People THINK that you can just TREAT criminals, but I know better! Giving people BETTER jobs and INCREASING social services AND better education doesn’t REDUCE crime; KILLING criminals STOPS crime!”

Steven ignored the large, psychotic man and ran to the terrified little boy with a sex toy in his mouth. “Onion, are you okay!” he moved to hug the terrified evil child, who leaned into Steven’s embrace as well as the ropes and bonds would allow him.

“Don’t get soft on me, UNIVERSE!” Crazy Steve shouted, “You TRIED your hippy bullshit on that Ruby with the Naval and LOOK where IT got YOU!” Steve stamped his foot, causing both Steven and Onion to flinch. “THIS IS my show! My WAY is the only WAY! I’m the ONLY smart person! I’M the only ONE who knows WHAT he’s doing! There’s a problem and ONLY I can FIX it!”

Steven looked down at Onion who was now sobbing into his ball-gag, then he looked back up at this man who’d insulted him, beat him and kidnapped a two year old. He was honestly not afraid of Steve, not anymore.

Unfortunately Crazy Steve misunderstood Steven’s expression (maybe it was the massive swelling) and thought that he was onboard with this crazy plan. “GOOD kid! And before we BEHEAD this little rat-FUCK! We can take his clothes off and HAVE a little fun with HIM, if you KNOW what I mean?”

“You’re evil” said Steven.

“The FUCK did you say?” Steve bellowed, raising his fist to strike Steven again.

“You’re evil,” Steven said a bit louder. “You’re everything wrong with the human race. Superman is cool, Green Lantern is cool, Batman is cool and you’re not Batman.” Confidence filled the boy even as the large man before him trembled with rage. “You think I’m not scared, that I haven’t been hurt? I’m scared pantless by Islamic terrorism, by crazy white nationalists, Timothy McVeigh or Dillon Roof types and evil aliens from outer space. I think you’re scared, whoever you are; why else would you be so mean and work so hard to scare and hurt everyone around you?”

It was like a Ren and Stimpy cartoon. It can’t have been healthy the way that the veins in Steve’s neck and temple pulsed through his Kevlar body armor or the way he ground his teeth like a meth head in the worst of the high. His form tightened and twisted and he cracked his neck like a boxer before a fight. His breathing came in ragged gasps and he forgot to use childish insults or all Steven “sweetheart” or something. Crazy Steve looked like he was going to explode like a giant hernia.

“After Jasper nearly blew up beach city, people were afraid,” Steven hugged Onion tight, shifting the boy away from Crazy Steve’s reach. “And people in town got together and rebuilt, like they always do after every bad thing. People care and they chose to care,” he looked at Steve with the very worst thing of all, pity. “But some people get afraid and they become the next generation of terrorists. You’re not Batman; you’re just Bin Laden in a cowl.”

“DON’T EVER CALL ME MUSLIM, YOU WAD!!!!!!” Crazy Steve howled like demon insane. He threw a punch for Steven’s throat, ready to murder the boy. This worked out in Steven’s favor.

Crazy Steve’s blow was powerful but rage had made him forget his training and precision. In his attempt to throat punch Steven Universe, he missed as the boy twisted out of the way and he lost his balance. The mad Batman impostor struggled to regain his balance and pin wheeled his arms wildly. One of his armored gauntlets struck the device around Steven’s gem. The heavy, metallic device exploded and from it came the shining pink Quartz.

Summoning his gem weapon, Steven held the pink energy shield against his attacker. Blows and kicks powerful enough to snap a neck or shatter a skull came down unrelenting. Crazy Steve foamed and screamed like a berserker, hollering and spitting like an angry chimpanzee.

Steven’s gem glowed as he tossed Onion away from him. Simultaneously, a bubble of pink energy encased the small devil boy and protected him from crashing into Crazy Steve’s weapon’s rack.

With his hands free, Steven could now focus his full attention on Crazy Steve, however Crazy Steve barrelled forward. The three hundred pound juggernaut of rudeness and fuck grabbed the edges of Steven’s shield and threw it sideways.

Steven went flying as he released his shield’s form, using his hovering powers he directed himself and landed softly near a rack full of swords and axes. Grabbing an Indian style kopesh he assumed the fighting stance that Pearl had taught him. The boy’s guts were full of drive like Amethyst had taught him to embrace and his gem glowed, feeling at one with the Universe like Garnet had taught him.

Multiple small pellets came flying at Steven’s feet and exploded into thick, white smoke. Unsure of what this was and recalling books about WW1 gas attacks that he and Connie rented from the library, Steven held his breath and surrounded himself in a pink bubble. It was not a moment too soon as Crazy Steve charged through the rapidly dissipating gas and began to pummel at the protective energy barrier.

Steven let down the bubble to let in fresh air and he was ready to face Steve’s onslaught. He swung his blade at Steve, which Steve blocked with his armored gauntlets. Running on adrenaline, Steven madly flailed with the blade; being totally unpredictable and erratic. Yet his mind was still working on an end plan.

For years the gems had trained Steven to fight, to defend himself and to take down enemies stronger or more ferocious than him. He’d taken in all that information but never truly incorporated everything until now. Amidst his erratic sword strikes keeping Crazy Steve at bay, Steven feinted, counter-feinted and backtracked in mid strike.

A skilled foe like Jasper, Bismuth, Deadshot or the real batman could have found a counter to Steven’s swordplay but Crazy Steve was not that fighter.

Dropping to his knees, Steven gave himself a thrust from his hover power and slid underneath Steve. Sometimes it was good to be short.

The kopesh slashed Crazy Steve’s inner thigh. By itself it wasn’t the most painful injury that Crazy Steve had taken but it had partially severed his iliotibial tract, a major tendon in the leg. So that meant no high kicks or running for Steve.

However the big bruiser hardly felt the injury and responded by throwing thermite packs everywhere he could. The flashes of heat even from the furthest thermite pouches seared the eyebrows off of Steven’s face.

Flashes of heat and flame melted weapons racks and turned medieval weapons into glowing puddles on the ground. The intense heat sucked the air from Steven’s lungs and had him gasping. One pack landed amidst a collection of guns and began detonating all the boxes of spare ammunition.

In the cave the exploding shells were amplified twenty fold and Steven could feel blood coming out of his ears. Stray thermite plumes caught on Steve’s cape and set the mad Batman impersonator on fire.

Steven could only watch in horror as Crazy Steve thrust out his burning cape like the wings of a creature on a Meatloaf cover. His incoherent bellowing and growling did nothing to reduce the impact that Steve was a comic book cosplaying hellspawn.

Extending his legs like inspector gadget, Steven leapt over Steve, just narrowly avoiding his powerful grasp. While he might be stronger and faster than any fifteen year old could hope to be, he didn’t think that he could match Crazy Steve’s brute strength.

Steven gasped for breath; vomiting up the cheeseburger that not-Alfred had left out for him earlier. Body tuned and coursing with gem based magical energies, Steven felt the batarangs coated in snake venom cut through the air. Steven rolled out of the way as the shuriken batarangs sunk into the stone wall of the cave behind him.

Over the roaring flames and exploding ammo, Steven heard the sound of a dinosaur roaring its dominance. The giant mechanical T-rex was stomping towards him, crushing the other batman themed memorabilia in the cave. Ghoulishly, half of its plastic skin was melted off, revealing the smouldering metal endoskeleton and hydraulics.

A stray bullet struck Steven in the shoulder, knocking him to the ground. The wound was numb and he’d likely feel the full agony of the shot when the adrenaline wore off, but at least it wasn’t deep and hasn’t shattered any bones.

The mecha T-rex was above him now; jaws open wide and roaring like Spielberg’s worst nightmare. Steven summoned the pink bubble around him and caused it to grow razor sharp spikes. Maybe he could get the thing to bite off more than it could chew.

Then the T-rex slipped and landed on its side, breaking apart like a poorly made toy and going up in a gasoline explosion as the aircraft motor chugging at the heart of the mechanical dinosaur opened a fuel line.

Steven winced as the exploding T-rex threw him back into the Batmobile, the spikes on his bubble cutting through the thick armor of the vehicle.

Steven got up shakily, using his kopesh sword as a cane. More than half of the fake Batcave was on fire. “Onion!” Steven croaked through his soot blackened lungs and throat. He had to find the mutant little boy before Steve did.

Activating his gem shield, he enlarged it until it covered nearly his whole body. He didn’t get far before stepping on a nail; curse the flip-flops he typically wore. Steven cringed with agony but fought through it for the sake of Onion.

His effort was rewarded when he saw Onion, free of the protective bubble reaching for a harpoon gun. Steven breathed a sigh of relief. His relief was short lived when he heard the sound of a gasoline engine over the dying sound of exploding bullets.

Crazy Steve laughed with satanic glee as he rode on top of his turbocharged riding mower; blue flames shooting out of the chrome exhaust pipes and the engine compartment trembling from the charged up power. The laughing psychopath nearly cried with joy as he saw the speedometer climb into the hundred MP/h range and gun through the cluttered, burning batcave. He smiled even wider as he saw the goat dumbly jump in front of his vehicle.

Steven cried out as Crazy Steve ran over the goat, blood guts and shit just gushing from under the grass chute. It was like a water park crossed with a fucking slaughterhouse.

Onion ran away as fast as his little legs could carry him while Steven waved his arms and started shouting to get Steve’s attention.

Crazy Steve clenched the steering wheel and laughed at what he thought was Steven’s impending doom. “I’M MAKING HUMAN CHILI, YOU SAVAGE COCKSUCKER!”

Vaguely inspired by something he saw in an anime once, Steven focused his gem powers, trying to channel his shapeshifting. His arm muscles bulged and grew, ripping his shirt sleeve. Then with a mighty toss, he hurled the kopesh sword at Crazy Steve with all his might.

The sword sunk deep into the hood of the John Deere. Fire and sparks belched out from the wound and Crazy Steve struggled to keep control of the vehicle, wrestling with the steering wheel like an angry alligator.

The Deere was swerving erratically and the blades were sparking and grinding on the cave floor. Taking a leap, Steven jumped onto the side of the mower between the fire breathing exhaust pipes and Steve’s muscular leg.

The turbo mower crashed, smashed and ground its way through the cramped cave, sucking up rats, tools and anything not nailed down under it. The grinding of metal was truly horrifying and at any second it felt like the jury rigged lawn machine would blow up.

Steve turned around to confront his rude passenger, preparing to stab Steven with a razor sharp batarang. Steven however was ready for his homicidal foe, tossing the handful of mud he’d grabbed off the floor before jumping onto Steve’s death machine of lethal doom. “Cave mud!” Steven cried out like Sailor Moon telegraphing an attack.

Crazy Steve cried out as his cowl was smeared with mud and bat shit. Now blinded, Crazy Steve randomly tugged at the steering wheel while stabbing in the air to try and find Steven’s jugular.

Steven summoned his shield into his muddy hand but a fraction of a second too slow. Steve’s sharp venom coated batarang was coming for his throat. At the last second though Crazy Steve’s aim was thrown off when a harpoon buried itself deep in his ass.

Crying out in pain, Steve wiped the mud from his eyes and tried to yank out the two feet of razor sharp, barbed metal that had gone cleanly up his anus and burst his intestines like a balloon. From a high vantage point on a rock ledge, Onion looked at Steven with admiration and even a little worship.

The mower crashed into the Batmobile, having done a full lap around the cave and blew up into a thousand pieces.

Crazy Steve fell to the ground with an injured leg tendon, a harpoon up his ass and suddenly a sword driven through his hand. The madman howled like a wounded bear as Steven drove his kopesh sword into Steve’s hand and through the ground, pinning him like a bug.

Hollering with rage, Steven raised his energy shield and slammed it into Steve’s face, knocking out one, no two no three, ten—actually all of Crazy Steve’s teeth. Totally lost to his own inner darkness, Steven raised the shield again and smashed it down again and again onto his enemy’s face.

Every insult, every stubbed toe, and every physical and mental pain Steven had ever taken he took out on the Batman impostor. He saw in this man the composite evil of every enemy he’d ever faced from Peridot all the way up to Yellow Diamond. The cruelty, selfishness and callousness in every one of them was perfect in this man; the ultimate human being devoid of empathy, jealous and proud of it, bloodthirsty, reveling in the pain he caused on those weaker than himself and utterly apathetic to the very “victims” that he claimed to protect. Unlike all the alien threats that Steven had ever faced this guy was pure earth grown. Any alien coming first time to earth could meet Crazy Steven and assume the human race wasn’t worth letting live.

Screaming one last time, Steven brought down his shield onto Steve’s hamburger face; his cowl damaged and his Bat ears flopping sideways like they’d gone through too many dryer cycles.

Steven felt exhausted as he saw Crazy Steve twitch and gurgle. It felt like the grim reaper had shown up and scooped out his heart, his happiness and his very sense of wellbeing in exchange for survival. It felt like he’d never be able to come down from this terrible fight or flight mode.

Then he felt the stonework under him crumble. Sulphurous smoke and heat escaped from the cracks and soon with it was blood red lighting.

Onion watched the cave floor crumble around Steven and the normally homicidal little boy waved his arms as though trying to tell Steven to run.

A falling stalactite fell from the ceiling and struck Steven unconscious. Him and Crazy Steve began to fall into the lava below.

Gravity took them and it looked like this was the end.

When the cloaked, soaring figure of Batman dive-bombed into the volcanic chamber and scooped up Steven in mid fall. Firing his grapnel gun, Batman caught hold of Amethyst’s whip and the Dark Night and the boy Universe shot upwards towards the cave.

Batman shot up from the smoking lava pit with a broken, bloodied and wounded Steven in his arms. The crystal gems wept to a man, this time with relief.

Batman stoically handed Steven off to Pearl, while Amethyst cuddled a crying, sobbing Onion. He turned and saw tears streaming from under Garnet’s sunglasses. The future seeing gem steadied herself and stared down the Batman.

“It’s not over,” Batman knew it.

Garnet gulped and spoke in a shaky voice. “It’s not the last we’ll see of him. It’s all coming together for the crash.”

“We’ll be ready,” said Batman. His tone softened as he saw Steven start to stir. “He’ll be ready. He’s stronger than I predicted and he didn’t kill Steve, even when he could have.”

“We’ll be ready,” affirmed Garnet, though she didn’t sound so sure.

_Demayo Barn, Delmarva_

* * *

 

Connie Mahashewran ducked under the blow from the stacked hooker in a Black Canary outfit. The young girl struck out with Rose Quartz’s sword, cutting in half the insane woman’s katana before kicking her square in the knee.

The not-Black Canary went down, an expression of agony and hate on her face right before Connie smashed the sword pommel into the blonde’s face as hard as she could. With that, Connie breathed a sigh of relief. “Score,” she congratulated herself.

Around the corner came the depressed gem Lapis Lazuli, who grabbed the Black Canary imposter with a hydrokinetic hand. In her other hydrokinetic hand was a Klansman in robes dyed green. “Let’s get this shit over with,” she deadpanned.

The green Dorito gem, Peridot grinned as she adjusted her bowtie. “Excellent work, New Crystal Gems! All celebratory confectionary baked goods are on me!”

“You didn’t do anything” said Lapis in a slightly annoyed voice.

The exuberant, nerdy green gem had other ideas. “But I put forth the plan which neutralized the drug dealing racist who stole the ring of Green Lantern.”

Connie had to agree, “Yeah, she’s right; I never would have thought to stab KKK lantern with a spike of my frozen pee. Plus Peridot sat there and took a beating to keep Ms. Irish ninja here from murdering everyone at the local Hooters.”

The Black canary impostor woke up from unconsciousness and snarled at Connie, “You little cunt, I had a good gig going on!”

Connie narrowed her eyes at the unstable blonde, “You tried to murder some guys who hit on you and innocent Hooters Waitresses.”

The Irish crazy woman scoffed. “They were just whores! I needed that money more than they did!”

“Hey!” Connie stopped her there. “There’s enough sexism in the world, us ladies need to show some solidarity.”

“Eat me, you little raghead!” the impostor spat.

Connie turned to Lapis, “You can do your thing now.”

In response, Lapis smashed the Irish murderer/robber’s head against that of the Klansman lantern; knocking both out with no small degree of enjoyment.

Peridot stepped between her two companions. “Well, allow me to repeat; good work, New Crystal Gems! That statuesque, leggy blonde would definitely have murdered all the humans in that building depending on the amount of kinetic energy she kept punching at my face; including your maternal caregiver, Connie.”

“What?” said Connie, who wasn’t able to process that her mom moonlighted as a Hooters girl.

Peridot put one stubby arm around Lapis’s waist, “Now, love chunks; let us flee romantically to the Barn where we may roll in the hay, metaphorically speaking.”

“I told you to stop calling me, Love chunks,” Lapis ground out with plenty of disgust.

Peridot was severely overestimating how smooth she was. “But Love Chunks, how else can I show my affection for you in public?”

Lapis grabbed Peridot by the bowtie and pulled her in a not friendly way. “How about I beat your face in, Peri?”

“Greetings!” came a voice from above. Diana, Wonder woman, Princess of the Amazons was descending from the clouds to meet the new Crystal gems.

Connie had to still herself to keep from fangirling too much in the presence of the great Wonder woman, while Peridot adjusted her hair to continue trying to be smooth.

“Welcome to our domicile, this humble Barn, o Man Hating Monarch.”

“That’s a myth,” said Wonder woman who was now examining the captives. “So what exactly happened with these two?”

Peridot stepped to explain, “Well o’ Monarch of Themescrya, my network of scanning drones picked up the presence of a metahuman presence similar to the fabled Black Canary; which turned out to be a murderous thief descended from the notorious O’Ninja clan in Monaghan. Simultaneously we discovered Green Lantern’s ring had been stolen by a KKK member named Bill. As you can see we were able to apprehend both with minimal casualties.”

Wonder woman was at a loss for words. “How did Green Lantern lose his ring?”

Lapis cut off Peridot, “Hey lady, we just took down a full powered Green Lantern; at the very least you owe use some drink vouchers.”

Wonder woman nodded to the blue gem. “I’ll speak to J’onn J’ones about that.” The Princess of Amazons turned to Peridot. “And you, stop calling your loved one names she’s not comfortable with.”

Peridot tried to protest. “But—

“No buts,” Wonder woman insisted firmly, “And never use the phrase ‘love chunks’ ever.” Her features softened as she put a hand on Lapis’s shoulder. “And thank you for not using hydrokinesis to threaten all of Gotham City.”

Lapis glowered and looked at the ground. “When Steven went missing I was planning on wiping out Gotham if he wasn’t returned in twenty-four hours. But I didn’t.” She signed and glanced over to Peridot with something close to forgiveness. “Humans aren’t bad, they’re just boring; they don’t deserve the worst of what I have to dish out.”

Wonder Woman smiled, “And I’ll see about some drink vouchers and possibly some coupons for free pizza.”

Lapis nodded respectfully to Wonder Woman, “I’ll take it.” With that, she took Peridot by the hand, causing her favorite Dorito gem to purr like a kitten.

Then Peridot’s eyes widened as she tapped her visor. “Egad! According to my drones, Keystone city is being attacked by a Flash clone who is a drug dealing extortionist who eats the hearts of little girls after molesting them!”

Wonder Woman’s eyes widened with shock and confusion. “Where are these impostors coming from?”

==============================================================================  
And that’s that.

That was so hard to write, but it was so thrilling at the same time. I had the chance to be serious and funny and I celebrated my love of Steven Universe and comics in general.

But I’m rather proud of this and I hope you enjoyed it. And let me know any criticism you have.


End file.
